Creatures




Snow, finally. It arrives on the night wind. News travels by phone before the blinds are lifted. Mere handfuls here, thickens cover towards the town. Not cold enough to keep for long so we leap to the fields, grabbing urgent gloves on the way.

Boots stall in the white impediment. Everywhere you look there is a picture.


Over there, iced moor hills: where the creatures that can live and die and never be known are free, making unseen tracks. I have thought of them, today: how I think of them: longingly, with envy, as things utterly connected, self-contained, without need of ego or any way to measure time.


Little Granddaughter has soon had enough of falling in this crunchy water: holds mittened hands up: a vote to spectate.

We are still lost in the novelty of contact.
If it doesn't last, it must be precious.
No-one needs to know we are here: the joy of life is in the moment, not the record. Tracks follow us back to the car.




Comments

Lisa Southard said…
(preempting Suze: if they are part of existence, that is their record: if God is all of us- this should make sense to you I think -I hope!)
18 January 2013 at 23:48
Suze said…
The joy of life is in the moment, not the record.

Diamond, I'm reeling ... What does this mean for storytellers, part of whose business is to pass it on?
19 January 2013 at 01:09
The Cranky said…
What a lovely thing to share with your granddaughter; and such a funny little creature you brought into existence.

Crunchy water; I like that.
19 January 2013 at 06:11
Lisa Southard said…
Suze: For me, the storyteller mission is to wake people up to witnessing their own moments: to help people survive the knowledge that there are uncountable numbers of moments all told; to know that if they clammer for attention all they may accomplish is to shout over other equally deserving people: to learn to be content counting their own moments: to encourage the hunt for genuine appreciation of simply being here: to find their own eye opening adventures. So I guess what I pass on is examples, really. Lists of examples! Started quite grand there, and it came down to a list... But if I didn't laugh at myself I would be missing my own point :-)
Jacqueline: Little Granddaughter was curious about the snow and about why we were so keen on it. For her, every day is full of interesting things to discover: this one made her hands cold. The snow thing in the picture is an old one: built by Girl, then aged 4. We used apple halves for eyes and they fell out as it melted- gruesome yet poignant and funny.
19 January 2013 at 11:05
Suze said…
Have read. Am mulling.

You know what has been hard, though? Writing those very unexceptional, exceptional moments and being drowned utterly by a tide of something other -- something trendy, popular, formulaic, gimmicky, momentarily-sought after according to what often feels like arbitrary vogue.

What has been hard is recording moments and having them putrefy on my hard drive. Recording moments and then reading about a hundred million directions and trying to decide which one is going to 'do the trick.'

Your words in this post are beautiful and pure. Mine in response are not despairing, but they are a very honest snapshot of not even knowing how this is all going to fall together, anymore. All I can do is keep recording moments and moving in directions as they appear on the horizon and hoping.

And excising, immediately, the gnarled, bitter branches that have, in the past, seemed to sprout overnight in response to every book already hardbound with an ISBN lining the shelves of bookshops and box stores. Because I know that just because they are there and I am not doesn't mean they've said something worth recording ... and that I have not.

:(
19 January 2013 at 15:25
Lisa Southard said…
Drinking coffee, Suze, at my table- think you should be here! After coffee: wine and intelligent sympathy. I hear you on this- we surely all have these contentions- 'which path is my path' and 'what is that talentless troll doing on a bookshelf?!' You would think that a vocation would be easier- why would something call so strong and then hide? We turn ourselves inside out and back to front trying to find it! There are times when I have wished to be a contented clerk or fishmonger or something more tangible and less introspective than this writer nonsense. (Insert audible sigh) Psychologically, there is still an imprint of the wall on my head. And I'm not despairing either- this is how it is- and this is how we are: vent, and get back to it. xoxoxo
19 January 2013 at 20:54
Suze said…
You the fishmonger, me the accountant. That's my 'tangible.' I cook the books in our household, pay every check the day the bill comes in, watch pennies like a beady-eyed hawk, keep the numbers in line. I always think accounting would be less painful and that I could do it well. And then I think, yeah, whatever, Cat.

(heaps of love)

19 January 2013 at 23:10
Lisa Southard said…
:-) *glugs wine, nods, giggles*
xxx
19 January 2013 at 23:15
Suze said…
Ha! I could picture that. Very nice. :)
20 January 2013 at 17:06
Anthony Hopper said…
It snowed here (for the first time this winter) a couple a few days ago as well. The snow was great-the power outage wasn't. :)
20 January 2013 at 20:04
Lisa Southard said…
Snow & no power Anthony- not so much fun! I liked your article on the 5 pre-modern inventions btw: felt rather smug as I knew the Mayans had vulcanised rubber :-)

Suze: Cheers! :-)
20 January 2013 at 20:46
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